Welcome to Applied Human Rights.This course is designed to do just a few things. It is designed to introduce you to some important questions about how we might think about and do to promote and protect human rights in Australia.

It is designed to work as an inquiry-based course. This course is run on the basis that whether as a teacher or as a student we are all collaborating in an inquiry based on thinking and research. Our inquiry is focused on human rights especially in Australia and on trying to work out what is actually happening and why it is happening and that doing both of these things matter. (This involves among other things the premise that truth is a basic human good). This means that you are not a passive vessel to be filled up with 'knowledge'. This means e.g., that there aren't any particular facts or information you need to memorise or get. It also means that you are not required to believe in human rights. Finally, it means precisely because we don't -and cannot- live in a 'post-truth world' that I will want you to use well understood tests and techniques of good reasoning, clear thinking and evidence to inform your inquiry. (You might want to think about why we cannot conceivably live in a world where truth doesn't matter).

The course will outline some of the key aspects of the history and development of an international discourse of human rights especially after 1945. The course will then introduce you to the evolution of an 'applied' human rights perspective which is multi-disciplinary in character, relies on education, dialogue and policy advocacy, as much as it does on legal processes. We will explore together what will be needed if we are to develop and sustain a culture of human rights in public and private organisations and in the wider community.

To do this, you will engage in an examination of the development of the first major 'bill of rights' in Australia namely the Victorian Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities 2006. You will be asked to develop a well-informed view of how this Charter works, and with what 'practical' effect. You will also be asked to think about the idea that any program of human rights needs to be clear about the ethical 'goods' it will promote or at least the 'bads' its will prevent, and how this process might contribute to promoting a culture of human rights'. You will be asked to think about the culture of your current workplace or some relevant public spaces, and the level of regard in those spaces for practices that are 'practical' because of those ethical ideas which human rights support.

Along the way this course will play a small role in assisting you to continue to develop some practical skills relevant to your professional practice. It is therefore to be understood as a process of professional development rather than just an abstracted academic process.